The reporting of sustainability issues has been based since the 2017 financial year on the GRI standards, including the Electric Utilities Sector Supplement.
The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) is a not-for-profit organisation that has the goal of supporting the sustainability reporting of international organisations and above all companies by developing uniform guidelines. The GRI provides comprehensive reporting standards with defined management approaches and indicators for companies to report their economic, environmental and social performance.
The reporting of sustainability issues has been based since the 2017 financial year on the GRI standards, including the Electric Utilities Sector Supplement. This report was created in accordance with the GRI standards – “Core” option. An audit will be carried out in the second quarter of 2022 as part of the GRI content index service. Further information on the GRI content index can be found at www.enbw.com/gri-index. Our sustainability reporting also complies with the Communication on Progress requirements for the UN Global Compact and is based to an increasing extent on the UN Sustainable Development Goals. These two framework standards, as well as the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, have been used as the basis for the non-financial declaration.
We have continuously expanded our processes over the last few years for identifying material topics and linking them with the development of the company’s strategy. Material aspects are determined via the framework provided by the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC), as well as in accordance with standards for sustainability reporting issued by the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). In addition, current developments flow into the determination of future key issues, such as the recommendations of the Task Force on Climate-related Finan[1]cial Disclosures (TCFD) on climate-related risk reporting.
We consider topics to be material if they have a significant influence on long-term value added and thus the performance and future viability of our company. Contributions to the strategic orientation as a sustainable and innovative infrastructure part[1]ner are of particular importance in this context. Furthermore, aspects reflecting any important economic, environmental and social impacts our company may have and that significantly influence the perception of stakeholders are also taken into account.
Material themes are continuously implemented in the functional and business units, as well as in the individual companies of EnBW. In addition, the findings from the materiality analysis flow into, for example, the strategy process and stakeholder management.
The materiality analysis process comprises three steps: the creation of an overview of the themes relevant to strategy and communication, the development of a list of themes relevant from the perspective of sustainability and the derivation of material themes from the reputation analysis. During each step of the process, the themes identified are regularly compared to the key themes that were dealt with by the Supervisory Board in the reporting year. Every step leads to a prioritization of the themes and ultimately to a final list of the top themes that can be allocated to the categories of transformation of the portfolio, growth and sustainability.